Author(s): Karen Russell

Fiction

The Bigtree alligator wrestling dynasty is in decline, and Ava, a resourceful but terrified twelve year-old, must battle to save it. After the death of her beautiful and legendary mother, Swamplandia!, Ava's island home in the Florida Everglades, is under threat from a nearby competitor; her sister Osceola has eloped with a ghost, her Grandpa Sawtooth has been sent to the mainland to an old folk's home, her brother has secretly defected to The World of Darkness, and her father, the Chief, is AWOL ...can a harrowing Odyssey to a perilpus part of the swamp keep that family finally afloat?